Little Words
by Alithea
Summary: Jenny runs into an old flame at the signing for her new book. A little wishfull thinking set a couple of years out. Jenny & Marina.


**_Title: Little Words  
_**_**Rating: PG-13/T (Teen)  
**__**I do not own the characters of The L Word just borrowing.  
**__**The poetry is mine  
**__**Femme slash/Yuri warnings  
**__**Author's Note: I suppose this is just a little wishful thinking on my part.**_

Jenny's head was beginning to throb slightly, and she felt a cramp forming in her hand. The vanity in her was pleased that so many people had shown up to have their book signed, but a more familiar part of her just wanted to get things over with and the attention away from her self. The line was moving at a steady pace though, and except for the occasional odd comment she kept her head down focusing on the repetitive action of signing her name. Her dark hair had grown out some and half hid her pale face as she continued through the motions.

Jenny's one saving grace over the course of the multitude of signings was her manager and the way he had everything organized. It was a simple system; everyone with a book to be signed got a little post-it note on which to spell their name, no long greetings or personalized notes allowed. The post-it was on the book, she would look at the name, open up to the appropriate page and just sign. She half-heartedly thought of an idea for a story where a football player was stuck in a perpetual loop of signing his own name for a never ending hoard of admiring fans. She hoped the idea would stick around. It would be a shame if it fluttered away.

The book itself was a collection of short stories. She had decided to take stories she had written from high school to her present. She took a hack saw to those stories and rewrote and reworked them until she felt she had what would qualify as decent works of fiction. There was only one story in the whole of the collection that remained a pretentious sentiment to the writer she used to be. The story was called, "Thus Spoke Sarah Schuster", and it was a little bit of everything she never wanted to be again, and it was a little bit of everything she knew she still was.

She glanced up briefly and smiled vaguely at the young woman who had just stepped up. Her sapphire blue eyes taking in the muted attractiveness and then shutting as she finished signing and handed over the prize, a glance was shot towards her manager and he mouthed something resembling, "only a few left", before turning his attention back to the store manager and some other person whom Jenny assumed was of importance.

A fan gushed at her and she barely heard the words. She wasn't sure how much she liked the un-elicited praise. She was almost positive praise felt better when it came naturally or with a tidbit of criticism at the end. She tried to keep smiling and not seem like one of those authors that think she's too good for her fans. There was a kink forming in her neck, coupling with the cramp in her hand and the head ache. She needed something to eat. The last thing she needed to do was faint. She was as good at fainting as she was creating labyrinths of chaos and drama for herself.

Another book was placed in front of her. The yellow post-it note was blank. She blinked and took the note off the cover and then opened the book to a blank page. She looked back at the post-it again and then made an uncomfortable noise that was akin to clearing her throat.

"Um... It doesn't... Who should I make this out to," she managed to ask and hoped she was loud enough to be heard over the general fuzzy sounds of background noises. There was a beat of silence and she had a brief premonition, a thought that made her refuse to look up from the title page of her book.

"Marina."

Jenny's eyes trailed slowly upward. The voice was unmistakable but the eyes, bright and wondering gems still had to see. She had to look even if every other part of her told her not to. Beyond the expensively casual clothes the woman wore, up, up her gaze moved. She felt stuck in slow motion. She felt odd that after all this time, after all... After everything...and now there was that voice, and the name. Up, up and her eyes caught the grin, that grin that was welcoming, friendly, and unabashedly inviting. Jenny had to look away from that grin but she didn't look down. She looked up into dark eyes.

Jenny lost to those eyes, every time. In the past she had fallen to those eyes, because there was mystery in them, intrigue, romance, but more... There was everything and she was not qualified to read everything those eyes had to say to her. Was there regret there? Was there a touch of anger? Was there lust?

There was always lust.

She swallowed and hurriedly looked down to sign the book. She looked up again and handed over the book and Marina's fingertips brushed against her hand.

"I look forward to reading it." Marina said softly, lingering just a little. There were still people behind her.

Jenny blinked and then quickly picked up the blank post-it that was on the table and scribbled the number of her hotel on it. She handed it out and felt her heart begin to pound uncontrollably in her chest as she waited the seconds for Marina to reach out take the post-it and move out of the way of the next person in line. She felt those eyes on her as she continued signing, but she didn't look to see where Marina was standing. Jenny knew when the older woman had left though. There was a feeling missing in the air and when that feeling vanished she felt like she had come up from being deep under water.

I always feel you just under my skin  
I think in that way is where it always begins  
With a touch of the light cast in your dark eyes  
The way you move to sit at my side  
And at last you start to speak  
That is when it's over, that is what makes me weak  
As you open me up, cut me apart  
And devour me with a word, then a glance  
However could I resist you  
However could I deny what you stir within me  
And then you are gone  
Leaving me unearthed, dismantled

With school charm and slight tantrum she managed to slink out of the dinner and drinks that her manager wanted her to attend. Instead she took the first cab she could find to her hotel and went up to her room. She waited. She fell asleep. She awoke with disappointment.

Jenny wasn't sure what she expected. Did she really think Marina, after all this time and distance, would accept an invitation from her to... And she wasn't even sure what she wanted. It felt like it had in the beginning, those long lost days when she had met Marina for the first time. Everything swelled around her and she felt what she never wanted again, what she always found herself feeling, and ultimately she wasn't sure she could blame Marina for making her feel that way.

She sat up and wiped the sleep from her eyes and then released a deep breath, a sigh that offered no relief. She shut her eyes and considered that she wasn't sure what she would even say to Marina. What could she say? What could she possibly ask that wouldn't sound horrible?

The phone rang and she was jolted out of her thoughts. She nervously edged towards it and then picked it up in a rushed motion of near desperation.

"Hi." She grimaced. She was being such a child. "Um no, it's not too late. I-" She listened and bit at her bottom lip. "I can...I can meet you downstairs in the bar. Right now...I'll go now." She cleared her throat nervously, "Okay. Okay I'll see you soon...then. Bye."

The phone was placed gently back onto the receiver and she flopped back onto the bed for a moment before jumping up and scouring through her suitcase for something to wear. There was never anything that seemed appropriate to wear. She gritted her teeth and hurriedly settled for jeans and a loose top. Jenny wanted to understand the force of the attraction. It haunted her. It played through all her other hopeless relationships. It tore at her. She felt like child. She felt like prey. Time, again, spoke in her mind. There had been so much space and time...but there had been no resolution. There hadn't been a goodbye, or finality. There was just the time and space, the not knowing, and the pretending not to care, the ghostly illusion that she had moved on.

Here I take these steps and wander back down  
Down here is a place I did not wish to return to  
My feet feel leaden as I travel  
The will of the earth keeping me from going back to you  
My one great demon, weakness  
My life changer, shaker, destroyer  
Will you lighten my burden  
Will you crush me again  
And when I touch the ground from such lofty heights  
I see you  
I see you and I continue to move  
I fall...I fall without end

The bar was empty save the bartender. Jenny wasn't sure how long she would have to wait and she ordered a martini to pass the time. She played with the olives, tracing them about her glass in between bird like sips and it was just when she felt relaxed and ready that she caught the movement of another person approaching. Glancing over to watch as Marina seated herself next to her, the low lights of the bar making her light olive skin just a touch darker. There was subtle greeting and then that grin, a smile that waned only for a moment.

"The book seems to be doing well," Marina stated.

Jenny nodded her head and began to fiddle with a cocktail napkin, "It is...it is... It uh... It's been a long tour though."

"I liked most of the stories, I read tonight."

Dark eyes borrowed into her and the writer wished she understood how there could be so much in so little.

"Only most of the stories?"

Marina grinned and leaned in a bit, "Yes, well, I think some selections could have used more work, or been omitted."

"Oh." She swallowed and scratched lightly at the back of her neck. "Any story in particular you thought-"

"Abraxas."

"Ah." She looked at the floor. She looked at her drink. She tried looking anywhere but at Marina. Finally out of desperation she asked, "How are you doing? I never thought...I thought..."

"I'm sure you did. I wouldn't think so highly of myself in that regard if I were you. The rumor is always worse than the truth."

"Is it?"

There was no answer, just a look, and the nearly imagined tug at the furthest corner of the older woman's lips. Jenny saw that and thought about kisses lying hidden in the corner of people's mouths, and how there was a hidden kiss. The hidden kiss that belonged to one person and no one else and she knew...she knew that kiss did not belong to her.

"I um... I um..." Jenny reached out and grabbed for her drink and then took a long sip before continuing. "I'm sorry."

"You always are." Marina ignored an awkward glance form the bartender. "Am I making you uncomfortable?"

Bright blue eyes blinked back and shut momentarily when she felt the older woman, this exotic, intoxicating beauty lean in even closer.

"No... I mean, a little... I um..." She fought for her own brand of bravery. "I just.. I don't know who you are Marina. I've never known. And you say things like if I paid attention I would know, but I still don't. You... You hurt me and I... I'm sure I hurt you and then you left and I... I don't know why you can do this to me."

There was the slight arch of a dark and shapely eyebrow. "And what is it, I do to you?"

"I... You make me feel so..." She reached. She had a vast vocabulary and all her words were gone. She wanted to say that she wanted explanations. She wanted to say that she felt used, but that she had no right to say that because she sort of used Marina too. She wanted to say that her life had not been the same since she had first laid eyes upon her. She wanted to say that she didn't want to go through anything like that again, because she felt it could only end. She didn't trust herself not to mess things up. She didn't trust that there would be some other random revelation that would fall from Marina's lips and crush her all over again. She shut her eyes and felt the heat of tears streaming down her face.

A hand reached out and caressed her cheek taking the tears with them. She opened her eyes and Marina was peering down at her. And Jenny lost all sense of place when she looked into those eyes, dark eyes, sad eyes, mysterious, lustful, hurtful, secretive, and all knowing eyes. Marina was so close, too close and they were only a breath apart. They were only half a moment from...

A kiss, light at first moving into depths of passion, there was in a kiss everything, the world in a kiss, and it traveled through Jenny's body at such a pace that she didn't even notice when the bartender started to clear his throat uncontrollably to get their attention. But finally they pulled apart and it took everything in her not to run away like she had the first time she had kissed Marina.

Jenny stared up at the beautiful and tall woman before her and then very quietly said, "I don't know if I can do this again. I can't... I can't share you. I can't make you promise me anything. I can't-"

"Then don't."

She didn't know what that meant. She searched for an answer on Marina's face and could only find those two words. She didn't have to be with Marina again. She didn't have to share Marina. She didn't have to make Marina promise. Her choices stretched out before her. Her choices coupled with what she could never understand.

She slid off the bar stool and took a step backwards.

Marina waited.

Jenny took another step back and still the older woman just watched her.

"Will you...Will you come up to my room?"

Marina grinned, and gave the most subtle of nods.

Over... are we over  
Over and over  
And you'll take me on my back  
Leaving me bruised with your kisses  
Those lips that leave and take forever  
Mark me with wanting  
For nothing else  
Can be so sweet as you  
So cruel as you and your eyes  
Your lips upon my own  
Leaving me to ponder your mysteries  
Cutting me open to your pleasure  
And we get lost under the feel  
We lose under the pull  
I'm not ready for you  
But I'll cleave myself open  
Leave me as you like me  
Torn apart, or sewn back whole  
Just let me pretend forever  
Forever in your arms

End...


End file.
